Fun Facts, Dorfromantik and Next Station: London in the running for Spiel des Jahres 2023

The games in the running for this year’s Spiel des Jahres awards have been revealed.

Spiel des Jahres is known as the industry’s most prestigious award for board and card games and is awarded annually by a jury of Germany game critics. Recent Spiel des Jahres winners include Just One, Cascadia and Micro Macro: Crime City.

The full list of nominees across all three categories can be found below:

Spiel des Jahres 2023

Dorfromantik: The Board Game (Designed by Michael Palm and Lukas Zach & Published by Pegasus Spiele): An adaptation of the popular video game, Dorfromantik sees players work together to lay hexagonal tiles to create a beautiful landscape and fulfil the orders of the population – all while laying as long a track and as long a river as possible.

Fun Facts (Designed by Kasper Lapp & Published by Repos Productions): This co-op game sees players secretly answer a question – like ‘How long is the perfect nap? – before arranging those answers in order, lowest to highest. This is done without seeing anyone’s answers, so you have to guess how you compare to the other players.

Next Station: London (Designed by Matthew Dunstan & Published by HCM Kinzel): Using coloured pencils, players redesign the London Underground, optimising connections, serving as many sights as possible and exploiting the tunnels that pass under the Thames.

Kennerspiel des Jahres 2023 (recognising excellence for more complex games)

Challengers! (Designed by Johannes Krenner and Markus Slawitscheck & Published by Z-Man Games): An interactive deck-management game centred around a capture the flag-style tournament.

Iki (Designed by Koota Yamada & Published by Giant Roc): A card drafting, set collection rondel game where players are trying to become the best artisan in Edo by helping the city and ensuring the well-being and prosperity of its people.

Planet Unknown (Designed by Ryan Lambert und Adam Rehberg & Published by Strohmann Games): A tile-placing game in which players attempt to develop the best planet.

Kinderspiel des Jahres 2023 (Children’s game of the Year)

Carla Caramel (Designed by Sara Zarian & Published by Loki): Players aim to serve customers their ice cream orders before they melt in the sun.

Gigamon (Designed by Johann Roussel and Karim Aouidad & Published by Mirakulus): A memory game with a twist that sees players find pairs of tiles in order to summon creatures with magical abilities.

Mysterium Kids: Captain Echo’s Treasure (Designed by Antonin Boccara and Yves Hirschfeld & Published by Libellund): A child-friendly version of the popular co-op deduction game.

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